Is Your Firewall Right for You?

With all the breaches, phishing attempts and malware infestations it has become more important than ever to have the right firewall in place. Often times, small businesses tend to think they don’t need that much protection due to their small size. The reality is there is no prejudice when it comes to the bad guys hacking into systems. Having the proper firewall, no matter what your size, can be your first line of defense against these attacks. Most internet service providers will provide you with a very basic firewall with minimum functionality. In today’s world everyone should have a firewall which provides a minimum of the following functions:

Content Filtering- This is where you can block outgoing traffic from going to different categories of sites. For instance, you can block steaming or known sites to that have been infected with malware.

Traffic Management- The ability to allow only certain type of traffic out. There is a wide range of options here. They can be from only allowing http and https traffic to blocking traffic to specific countries. This can be important because often times malware will report or open ports so hackers/hijackers can access your network and they are usually in foreign countries.

VPN- this is extremely important. Many small businesses opt to go the easy route and allow remote desktop access through the firewall. This allows hackers to scan your network and when they find this opening they begin brute force attacks to crack your user password. Once they are in they can steal data or encrypt your files usually doing both.

If you are not sure how your firewall is setup or if you have this functionality give us a call and we can evaluate your current situation to make sure it is secure and meets your needs.